Backstory-
When I was 19 years years old, I joined a band called The Phantoms. I’d been playing out since I was 14, but I still refer to them as my first “real” band, as we played all over the place, not just in the town we lived in. It was also my first experience with playing with guys my dad’s age, who didn’t have full time jobs, and mostly played music.
The front man was a guy named Dan Calhoun, and he was my first real musical mentor outside of my father. He taught me how to really be in a band, how to live with other people crammed in a van, a lot about life in general, and really shaped who I would become as a musician over the thirty years since then. He was the guy who walked me through learning that it’s easy to be in a band when you only have to see the other people in it a few hours a week. It’s a whole different ballgame when you all live together on the road.
Dan’s main guitar was a black ‘69 Strat. Big headstock. Rosewood. Black pickup covers and knobs. It had a mint guard. The neck and middle pickups had been rewound by a local guitar guru dude, and were quite a bit hotter than typical Strat pickups. His bridge pickup was a very early DiMarzio he claimed to have bought from Larry at a guitar show somewhere. It was black and had six hexagonal pole pieces like the kind you see on a Super distortion. That guitar was beat to hell and back, and sounded amazing. And that bridge pickup was pretty hot.
I hadn’t seen Dan since about 1994 when I got a wild hair in the fall of 2020 and went deep diving into the internet to see if I could find him. I really wanted to reach out and thank him for all he did for me, let him know that I’m still doing it all these years later, and that I still think about him all the time. He is in no small part responsible for me pursuing playing the way I have.
Imagine my disappointment when I found his obituary from the previous fall. I was seriously bummed out.
Fast forward to this morning, and I’m surfing CL while I eat a sandwich when I see a black MIM Strat body and big headstock MIA neck listed right on top of each other. Something clicked in my head and told me they needed to be together.
Fast forward to this afternoon-
I now have a Dan Calhoun tribute Strat.
Black body, large headstock/logo MIA neck. I stopped at GC and grabbed a mint green guard. The rest of the parts came from my stash. Vintage style bridge, Texas Specials for the neck and middle to approximate his overwound home brews. I know I’ll never find a DiMarzio like he had, but I had a Chopper in my toolbox so I used that. Black covers and knobs. Wired it up like his, too. Five way switch. Master volume, neck tone, bridge tone. No tone for middle pickup. It has sperzel tuners cause they came with the neck. IIRC, his were black Schaller. But how cool is it that these are still black?
It came out really nice. Plays very well, and sounds great. I’d like a little brighter pickup for the bridge. I’ll also eventually get a better bridge than the MIM one that’s on there. Overall though, I’m very happy with how it turned out. It almost feels like I got a little bit of Dan back with this one.
The only really important thing I’m missing, are two little tiny water slide decals of hula girls to put on either side of the “Original Contour Body” logo on the headstock. I have no idea if I’ll ever find those, but I’ll be looking for them.
When I was 19 years years old, I joined a band called The Phantoms. I’d been playing out since I was 14, but I still refer to them as my first “real” band, as we played all over the place, not just in the town we lived in. It was also my first experience with playing with guys my dad’s age, who didn’t have full time jobs, and mostly played music.
The front man was a guy named Dan Calhoun, and he was my first real musical mentor outside of my father. He taught me how to really be in a band, how to live with other people crammed in a van, a lot about life in general, and really shaped who I would become as a musician over the thirty years since then. He was the guy who walked me through learning that it’s easy to be in a band when you only have to see the other people in it a few hours a week. It’s a whole different ballgame when you all live together on the road.
Dan’s main guitar was a black ‘69 Strat. Big headstock. Rosewood. Black pickup covers and knobs. It had a mint guard. The neck and middle pickups had been rewound by a local guitar guru dude, and were quite a bit hotter than typical Strat pickups. His bridge pickup was a very early DiMarzio he claimed to have bought from Larry at a guitar show somewhere. It was black and had six hexagonal pole pieces like the kind you see on a Super distortion. That guitar was beat to hell and back, and sounded amazing. And that bridge pickup was pretty hot.
I hadn’t seen Dan since about 1994 when I got a wild hair in the fall of 2020 and went deep diving into the internet to see if I could find him. I really wanted to reach out and thank him for all he did for me, let him know that I’m still doing it all these years later, and that I still think about him all the time. He is in no small part responsible for me pursuing playing the way I have.
Imagine my disappointment when I found his obituary from the previous fall. I was seriously bummed out.
Fast forward to this morning, and I’m surfing CL while I eat a sandwich when I see a black MIM Strat body and big headstock MIA neck listed right on top of each other. Something clicked in my head and told me they needed to be together.
Fast forward to this afternoon-
I now have a Dan Calhoun tribute Strat.
Black body, large headstock/logo MIA neck. I stopped at GC and grabbed a mint green guard. The rest of the parts came from my stash. Vintage style bridge, Texas Specials for the neck and middle to approximate his overwound home brews. I know I’ll never find a DiMarzio like he had, but I had a Chopper in my toolbox so I used that. Black covers and knobs. Wired it up like his, too. Five way switch. Master volume, neck tone, bridge tone. No tone for middle pickup. It has sperzel tuners cause they came with the neck. IIRC, his were black Schaller. But how cool is it that these are still black?
It came out really nice. Plays very well, and sounds great. I’d like a little brighter pickup for the bridge. I’ll also eventually get a better bridge than the MIM one that’s on there. Overall though, I’m very happy with how it turned out. It almost feels like I got a little bit of Dan back with this one.
The only really important thing I’m missing, are two little tiny water slide decals of hula girls to put on either side of the “Original Contour Body” logo on the headstock. I have no idea if I’ll ever find those, but I’ll be looking for them.
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Not sure if that helps, but... maybe it's a start?
